People welcome digital prayer during church services. As mentioned on page 19, significant percentages of both Christians and non-Christians indicate they are at least somewhat open to participating in a time of prayer during an online church service. From another angle, one-on-one prayer (27%) ranks second only to sermons as a digital option churched adults would be interested in experiencing (communal group prayer comes in lower, at 14%).

Yet, just as with online church attendance, openness and participation (not to mention meaningful engagement) don’t always go hand in hand. Only about three in 10 Christians report participating in the various types of digital corporate prayer Barna asked about (28% in digital prayer gatherings in the past year, 34% in small group digital prayer every 6 months, 32% in large-group digital prayer every 6 months). During the months of the pandemic response in particular, 16 percent of churched adults noted their whole household had been a part of digital prayer experiences.

There are many prohibitive factors to consider when trying to figure out why some people may be interested in attending a digital gathering yet have not actually done so. As covered already in this report, a church’s suite of digital options (at this point, still largely built around transplanting the standard service and sermon to the internet) is the most fundamental factor, and might not be enough to satisfy some Christians’ openness to digital prayer.

Surely, resources and access to technology can prove to be a hurdle for some. With any online survey methodology, like the one used for this study, there is difficulty in capturing the responses of individuals without reliable access to computers, cell phones or other technologies that would allow them to participate at all in digital church. Similarly, churches need to consider who may be at the margins of the digital church and prayer experience due to technological access or ability.

However, in the course of this study, we learned about some of the other practical and personal reasons for not attending digital prayer gatherings.